Chapter 3

Epiphany was asleep, she was naked, and laying on her stomach; I kissed her shoulder, and left.  I could hear her stirring as I closed the door behind me.  I sat on the stairs of her building hugging my jacket.  Down the street there was a coffeehouse.  I stepped inside for a tea and a croissant.  Sitting against the window a few tables away there was a girl staring out at the people walking by; she had a book in her hand and was marking the page with her finger.  She wasn’t reading, at least not that I could tell, just staring out at the people.  She picked up her cup and brought it to her lips taking a sip, noticing my staring-she blushed-and took another sip, looked down, and smiled.  I took a sip of my tea and nodded.  She went back to staring out the window.  I continued eating my croissant.  When I had finished I walked out of the cafe.  I walked the few blocks to Washington Square park, sat on a cold bench, and pretended to read an old newspaper I found under a tree.  I overheard a pair of university students talking with one another.  “… Well, then how is it that though we are all human, and essentially the same, that a person can claim with absolute certainty that they can know something as profound as God when another person cannot?”  The question went unanswered, at least, in the time it would take them to walk a good distance from me.  I more or less ignored the question and instead thought of Burroughs and Kerouac, and how they may have sat under a similar sky feeling as uncertain as I.  They would be waiting, restlessly, as a train settled uncomfortably on the track.  Warm, still, from a steam, thick and covering the platform, so thick even they could no longer make out the faces of those around them, and the faces of each other, they would only be a silhouette dissolving into the steam like acid on their tongues.  The two had never intended to go anywhere and would instead discover contentment amongst these people.  People they would never know, or even care to know, of who they were or where they were headed.  These were two people hard fought for some spare time, they were writing books, and listening to records while waiting for something they were never going to find; perhaps, though, they would have-- if they had ever gotten that chance.  It started snowing, pretty heavily, and was already leaving a soft blanket on the ground I didn’t leave.  I let the snow fall on me until my eyelids grew heavy and wet.  Still I lay in the snow staring at the sky, it was so white, and there was a purity I couldn’t immediately describe.  I felt the words flow through me, building as if they were coming from somewhere further inside than I have ever ventured.  I had nothing to write on and would not allow myself to leave.  I settled for knowing that these words would be lost by circumstance, as I would be lucky to remember even a single progression of thought; at least, in this clarity, I am capable of recognizing these moments of brilliance.  I felt someone watching me, they were sitting in the snow on the marble bench just a few yards away waiting for me to feel their presence.  When I didn’t look up they shifted their weight pushing some of the snow off onto the ground.  It was the girl from the cafe.  The book still in her hand, and her finger still marking the page.  She had a very natural beauty, a beauty I didn’t at first notice from the other end of the cafe, looking at me now with dark piercing eyes-never once did she look to the side or even blink-and she looked at me as if doing so with her entire body.  Her hair was in a pony, but loosely, and a single strand fell and covered her face.  “Do you remember me?” she asked quietly, finally breaking a silence.  I answered only with a smile.  We left together talking as if we’d known each other for years.  We talked as if neither had shame or fear, asking questions about intentions and uncertainties.  A conversation that became very political, very sexual, and very honest.  We went on talking like this for several blocks, and a few hours; we went on talking as the snow stopped, while the sun briefly came out, and as the snow started again.  We quit walking at the steps of her apartment, she invited me up, I politely declined, and she went upstairs.  I never asked her name.  It was perfect.  I would hold on to this memory for some time, losing only minor details throughout the following years, and realizing how rare and unusual such conversations can be.  For the first time in a while I felt content, and could honestly say so without having to lie to myself or others.  I continued walking for several minuets, in circles, stopping again in Washington Square Park.  I stood overlooking where I was laying not too long before.  Looking down at the outline of my body, just staring at that spot trying to make sense of time and my order in it.  I thought of all the people I shared this space with and how likely I was to ever see or know them.  I stood there longer than I realized drifting in and out of my conscious thought.  It had stopped snowing, I couldn’t tell you for how long, and the park was already beginning to fill with people, music replaced what was once just the silence of a falling snow, and before now I didn’t realize how quiet the park really was.  I walked under the arch and up fifth avenue until I understood how cold it really was.  I needed to spend time this afternoon working and decided to sit in a Starbucks on the upper east side, secluding myself from the possibility of anything interesting, ordered a water and attempted to write an article about the snow.  Instead all I could think of was that question that the one university student posed to the other, “How is it that though we are all human, and essentially the same, that a person can claim with absolute certainty that they can know something as profound as God when another person cannot?”  It made me reconsider who we perceive every day life on a daily basis.  How can we be sure that one person will think or see the same way as another?  This is a question I’ve heard argued forever, I have even been in the position having a debate with friends about colors and our personal perception them.  But why assume that we don’t think and see them same way?  Just because there’s a possibility that we don’t.  It seems more reasonable to assume that we do.  And with that said how can one person be so sure that there is a God if I can’t be?  “They just know..” isn’t an argument at all, because I can say with absolute certainty that I do not know for sure and they don’t possess some supreme infallibility that I do not.  So how can someone be absolutely sure about God?  I ended up writing down a lot of questions that I eventually reworked into a poem and titled it “Snow,” locked it away deep within the lost files of my computer and forgot about it.  

I found life a little less appealing every day.  And though it was something that came on gradually I haven’t picked up on it before now, until my walk through the village the other day with my stranger, and finally being able to accept that I had been lying about the state of my being brought to my attention how mundane, typical, and routine my life had really gotten.  This poem, “Snow” demanded a whole new level of myself that I wasn’t sure I was able to fulfill.  It became a new standard, and not just for my writing but for the way I lived my life as well. .